Press release

Press release

Press release

Ternat, 8 November 2018 – This morning Redevco, the asset manager that specialises in retail property, opened its latest retail park, The Leaf Shopping Ternat. This also marked the start of a week of festivities, during which customers can enjoy numerous animations and workshops. The park accommodates 13 shops and a restaurant; after an intensive period of construction, they are proud to show their new interior and collections to the public.

The construction work on The Leaf Shopping Ternat, alongside the E40 exit, began at the end of March 2017. On 7 February 2018, BricoPlanit was the first retailer to open its doors: 12.000 m² of floor space.

Today, after a little over 19 months of construction, the other twelve shops and the Lunch Garden restaurant finally opened to the public. Customers can do their everyday shopping at Albert Heijn. They can go to Leenbakker, Vandenborre and Action for their interior design, electronics and household requirements. A fine range of fashion and shoes is on display at e5 Mode, Brantano Market, Giks, Lola Liza / Hunkemöller, JBC and Torfs. And everything relating to well-being, health, perfumery and cosmetics can be found at Medi-Market and ICI Paris XL.

BREEAM – The objective is a rating of Excellent
With The Leaf Shopping Ternat, which has a gross floor area of 28,000 m² and more than 900 parking spaces, Redevco is aiming for a BREEAM rating of Excellent in the context of sustainable building and management. To that end, 50,000 tons of demolition materials from the old site were reused for the foundations of the car park and the buildings. During the construction process as much work as possible was carried out in collaboration with local partners so as to keep the transportation distance to a minimum and to handle the energy consumption and waste separation on site in a sustainable manner. ‘Wadi’s were created (a type of channel in which rainwater is buffered, thereby attracting fauna and flora) and a timber bank was built using trees felled on the site, with a view to sheltering small animals and insects. In fact there is a genuine insect hotel at the entrance to The Leaf.

‘The Leaf Shopping Ternat was built in accordance with the Cradle-to-Cradle® principle, whereby not only are the construction materials used recyclable at the end of their life, but the entire structure of the building can also be dismantled and moved to another location,’ says Kristof Restiau, Managing Director of Redevco. ‘Another striking feature is the number of green roof systems, which represent more than 50% of the total roof area. Solar panels on the remaining roof area of every shop take care of the future green energy requirements.’

The ‘light catchers’ in the roofs of the buildings are remarkable too. These panels allow the natural light to reach the shop floor via an ingenious system of mirrors that rotate to follow the position of the sun. This ensures a pleasant ambiance in the shops.

Redevco thanks its tenants, the retailers, for signing a Green Lease (a sustainability covenant), thereby also demonstrating their commitment to extending sustainability and the well-being of customers and staff to their own shop floor.

The first solar panel ‘e-Tree’ in Belgium completes the picture. This artificial tree, erected in the middle of the car park, captures the sunlight via its leaves and converts it into energy. The power points on the benches benefit from this green energy, and cyclists can inflate their bike tyres under the e-Tree.

A natural playground has been installed as well, including a maze built of recycled tree trunks.

Week of festivities until 17 November
Every day until Saturday 17 November there will be numerous activities and workshops.
Specially for the week of festivities a pop-up area “The Leaf” has been set up for customers to get a drink or rest for a while. Almost every day, people can also take part in sustainability workshops in this area.

‘We are exceptionally proud of our latest completion and the construction partners, as well as of our own team; all of them worked hard on this project,’ asserts Kristof Restiau. ‘And needless to say we are proud of our retail tenants, who bought into our vision on sustainability. They have created fabulous store concepts here in The Leaf Shopping Ternat.’

The Leaf Shopping Ternat, including the programme of activities, can be followed on www.theleaf.be, its Facebook page and Instagram feed.